I cook. I eat. I tell you all about it.

Quite possibly the longest recipe title to date, today’s post was born from the combination of a simple stuffed pork loin married with one of my favorite appetizers, the “Devil on Horseback”. While there are variations on the theme, the dish as I know it is a fig, stuffed with gorgonzola, wrapped with bacon, and cooked until caramelized. This pork loin dish combines fruit (prunes and apricots) with cheese (gorgonzola) and cured pork (prosciutto) finished with a mushroom sherry sauce. How can you possibly go wrong?

You can buy a whole pork loin for this dish, and butterfly it yourself, but I was feeling lazy and had my butcher do it for me. If you are doing it yourself, you’ll want to use a long, thin, sharp knife (a filet knife for fish is a good one to use). Make an incision along the length of the loin and slowly cut the loin to about 1/4 inch thick as you unroll it. Alternatively you can make an incision halfway through the loin and simply stuff in as much as you can, but this won’t achieve quite the same result as spreading the meat out flat and rolling like a cigar.

Apricot, Prune, and Gorgonzola Stuffed Pork Loin (serves 4):

Ingredients:

1 pork tenderloin, butterflied

1/4 lb gorgonzola, crumbled

1/2 cup sliced dried apricots

1/2 cup sliced prunes

1/4 lb thinly sliced prosciutto

1/2 lb white mushrooms, sliced

1/2 lb shiitake mushrooms, sliced

1/2 stick butter

1/4 cup olive oil

1/2 cup sherry

1 T fresh ch0pped rosemary

1 T flour

salt and fresh black pepper

Procedure:

Heat the olive oil in a skillet large enough to hold the loin over medium heat. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Meanwhile, spread the pork flat on a cutting board, and layer the dried fruit and cheese inside the loin.

Sprinkle with the rosemary, and roll up to form a log. Place the slices of prosciutto underneath the pork loin, and roll to wrap tightly.

Here is what it will look like once wrapped:

Next, place the prosciutto-wrapped loin in the hot skillet, and crisp the prosciutto on all sides (5-10 minutes). You can actually cook the loin in the pan and avoid the oven altogether, but if you are serving this to a crowd you may want to quarter some small potatoes, mince some garlic and shallots, toss them with olive oil, salt, and pepper, and throw them in a roasting pan in the oven to cook while the pork loin crisps. You can then finish the loin in the oven (for approximately 10 minutes) while the potatoes finish up.

While the loin cooks, melt the butter in the other half of the pan, and saute the mushrooms.

At this point you can transfer the meat to the oven, covered in foil, to cook for 1o minutes while you make the sauce. Add the sherry to the mushrooms, and cook for 2 minutes. Push the mushrooms to one side of the pan, and allow some butter and sherry to flow to one corner. Add the flour, and whisk to make a roux. Once smooth, stir in the mushrooms and cook the sauce until slightly thickened. Season with a few turns of fresh black pepper and a pinch of salt. Remove from heat.

Once the pork is cooked, remove and slice. Finish with the mushroom sherry sauce, and serve.